


no-scoped

by lupinely



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Gamer AU - Freeform, M/M, Pro-Gaming AU, they .... theyre all pro gamers. they play video games and thats what this fic is.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-01
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-11-07 10:05:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17958452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lupinely/pseuds/lupinely
Summary: “There are many famous duos in the Albion Tournaments esports scene,” wrote one journalist, “but none so well-known and beloved as that of crownprince and Emrys. They play like two halves of a whole: where one is, the other always follows."[Professional gamer AU] Halfway through the season, Merlin gets signed to the Ealdor Warlocks. Arthur, team captain of the Knights of Camelot, finds this bothersome. Very bothersome.





	no-scoped

**Author's Note:**

> Listen. Sometimes you watch BBC Merlin for the first time in February 2019, and also Overwatch League season 2 starts, and so you write a pro gamer AU fic. I can't explain myself either.
> 
> No knowledge of pro gaming is required! See the end notes for some handy definitions and explanations. I am sorry also. Thank you for reading.

 

   

Gwaine is the one who bursts into Arthur’s room at the team house when the news breaks. “ARTHUR,” he shouts, and jumps straight onto the bed and starts hitting Arthur repeatedly over the head with a pillow. “ARTHUR WAKE UP.”

“Gwaine, what the hell,” Arthur says, trying to turn over and go back to sleep.

“Emrys got signed,” says Gwaine. Arthur comes completely awake at once. “He’s in the league! Get up, man, come on.”

Arthur sits up. “Who signed him?” He hopes against hope that he doesn’t sound as apprehensive as he feels. “Not...?”

“Not us.” Gwaine has stopped hitting Arthur with the pillow, which is surely why Arthur feels flooded with relief. Surely. “I _wish._ No, it’s the Warlocks.”

Arthur puts his head in his hands. “Oh my god, why.”

Gwaine pats Arthur on the back. “Yeah, I know. Come on, we’ve got scrims in an hour. Coach has got some new strats he wants us to try.”

“Yeah,” Arthur says, “great,” and when Gwaine leaves the room he falls back against the bed and covers his head with his pillow.

   

 

“This is gonna bring so many new people to the league,” Gwaine says at breakfast with the rest of the team. “Emrys is one of the biggest streamers out there, his fans are gonna go nuts.”

“Great,” Arthur says. The others instantly notice the strange catch in his voice. They all spend way too much time together in this damn house.

“Something bothering you, captain?” Lancelot asks. He sounds almost sympathetic. Arthur knows this to be a complete lie.

“No.”

“Suuure,” Gwaine says. Everyone else at the table snickers. Arthur glares at them all but says nothing. They’re still laughing when Uther comes into the room and silences them with a look.

“Hurry up,” says Uther, “you’re all late for scrims,” even though they’re not, and everyone pretty much keeps quiet after that and hustles to the team practice room, sitting at their computers and putting on headsets and booting up monitors. Arthur pays very close attention to his mouse, pretending to adjust the settings and sensitivity, while the others get set up.

He needs to focus. It is mid-season, and the Knights of Camelot are leading the league, but that could easily change. Albion Tournaments is a complex, strategic game with a huge cult following—Arthur has been playing it for years but only got signed to the Knights at the beginning of this season, though when he joined he immediately took on the role of team captain. There are five players to a side in the game itself, with two sides playing against each other to attack or defend a point or accompany a payload to a destination. Usually two people play the aggressive role of attack, two people plays defensively as tanks, and the last player fills the healer support role. Arthur is the Knights’ main tank, though Uther has tried to convince him repeatedly to change to attack. But Arthur likes tanking and finds it easiest to direct his teammates and call shots for them in that role. Besides, they already have great attack players in Gwaine and Elyan. Lancelot is their main healer, and Leon their off-tank.

“Arthur, are you listening?” Uther demands. Arthur turns on his headset, nodding hastily even though he certainly wasn’t.

Why is he so bothered by Emrys’s pick up? It has long been an inevitability that he would join the Albion Tournaments professional league. He is an amazing player, the best healer that Arthur has ever played with.

Of course, Arthur thinks as the practice match starts, that’s the whole problem.

 

   

“Wait.” Merlin is not quite sure he believes what he’s hearing. “You’re hiring me?”

Gaius, coach of the Ealdor Warlocks, smiles and puts a hand on Merlin’s shoulder. “I hope that’s not too much of a shock,” he says. “We need you moved in to the team house by Monday.”

“Yes,” Merlin says, “of course, yes,” and the next two days are a flurry of moving, phone calls to his mother, interviews with various journalists, anxiety, and excitement. The Warlocks are his dream team, though he has never said a word of that to anyone before. Even when he is all moved in to his new room at the team house, he can hardly believe this is real.

Merlin sits on his new bed, his head spinning, momentarily overwhelmed by it all, until a knock comes at his door and he stands. “Yeah?”

Gwen pokes her head into the room. “Gaius wants us in the kitchen.” She smiles. “Welcome, by the way.”

“I’m glad to be here.” Merlin has spoken to Gwen a few times before—they’ve played together a handful of times non-competitively. But it is different to actually be here playing for the Warlocks.

Gwen laughs. “And boy are we glad to have you,” she says. “Morgana is sick of being forced to play healer. She’s gonna be so relieved.”

Merlin blinks at her. “You guys had _Morgana_ playing _healer?”_

“You see how dire our situation was. Come on.” Gwen leads Merlin downstairs. “It was really unfortunate, honestly—Morgana was desperate to play and thought she would never get signed, what with Uther blackballing her and everything—asshole—but Gaius took a chance on her. He’s good like that. We had just lost our other healer to retirement though, so we really had no choice.... But now we’ve got you.”

“Yeah,” Merlin says, a little dazed. “Did Uther really do that?” He has heard rumors, of course, but they had seemed so over-the-top; the players he knows on the Knights of Camelot are good people. It is hard to believe their coach could be so unfair.

“Uther is the fucking worst,” Gwen says cheerfully as they enter the kitchen. “The Knights might be our rivals, but even so, I wouldn’t wish Uther on them for anything.”

 _“I_ would,” says Morgana from where she is seated with her feet up on the table.

“That’s just because you’re mad Uther hired your brother and not you,” Gwen says. “Which, I mean, is pretty fair, I guess.”

“He hired your brother too.”

“Yeah,” Gwen says. “Weird. Almost like there’s something about you and me specifically that Uther doesn’t like.”

“He didn’t hire _my_ brother,” says Freya. “Wonder if he should be offended.”

“I wouldn’t be,” says their last teammate, Will, who is also the person Merlin knows best on this team, as they had been contenders teammates once. “Hey, Emrys. What’s up?”

Morgana groans. “Can we _please_ call each other by our real names like adults and _not_ our gamertags.”

Will rolls his eyes. “Fine,” he says, and then when Morgana turns away he adds in a loud whisper, “Le_fay.”

She glowers at him.

“All right, all right, everyone,” Gaius says as he walks into the room on the tail end of this conversation. “We have a lot of scrims to do to get our newest team member up to speed before the second half of the season starts in two weeks. Let’s focus up.”

“Sir, yes, sir,” says Will, sketching a hasty salute, and Freya laughs.

  

 

Later that night, Merlin decides to play some ranked matches to wind down for the end of the day. At the start of a new match, he gets a message from a player on the other team, written in frenetic all caps.

>coolknight69 says: BRO!!!!!! HEARD ABOUT THE SIGNING!!!! POG DUDE!

Merlin grins. >hey gwaine, he writes back. >how have you been?

>coolknight69 says: everythings craaaaaaazy dude. this season is gonna be sick especially now that ur signed. u excited?

>Emrys says: extremely

The match countdown hits zero. In the global chat, Gwaine types: >gl hf everyone, before he messages Merlin directly: >im gonna wreck u dude lol.

He doesn’t, though. Merlin’s team wins after a few tense rounds without either side really gaining the advantage over the other until the very end in overtime.

>coolknight69 says: UGHHHHH dude gg wp. ur gonna be a beast to play against lol. see u soon man hope ur loving ur new team

>Emrys says: I appreciate it, gg

A minute later, when Merlin is queuing for his next match and scrolling distractedly on his phone, he gets another message from Gwaine, one that sends a lurch through his stomach.

>coolknight69 says: arthur’s so mad u know lololol i thought he was gonna kill me when i told him the news

Merlin does not know how to respond. He leaves the message unanswered as his next match starts, listening to his heart thump loudly in his ears all the while. It is a long time before he manages to calm down.

  

  

A few months ago, Merlin and Arthur had been teammates on the Silver Dragons contenders team. The contenders league is composed of aspiring pro players who compete to show off their skill and gain experience in the hopes that one of the professional teams will notice and sign them. Merlin and Arthur had been the superstars of their team, the dynamic duo, the glue that held the roster together. Fans loved them. Journalists raved about them, saying that their ascension to pro esports was imminent.

“There are many famous duos in the Albion Tournaments esports scene,” wrote one journalist, “but none so well-known and beloved as that of crownprince and Emrys. While other famous duos—bastet and Le_fay, coolknight69 and ironclad—are aggressive attack players, Emrys and crownprince prove that the relationship between support and tank players is the fundamental foundation of a winning team. They play like two halves of a whole: where one is, the other always follows to support them from the backline, and their synergy is so seamless that it is hard to believe there is any verbal communication happening between them at all. Their dynamic plays like pure instinct, and it is a joy and thrill to watch the two of them during a match. It is only a matter of time before they are signed to a professional team—the only question is whether they will be signed together or individually, and what consequences that will have for their future performance.”

They were not signed together. Arthur was hired by the Knights of Camelot at the start of this season, and Merlin...wasn’t.

Which was all right—not really, but Merlin could have borne it, had Arthur not proceeded to lose his fucking mind and stop talking to Merlin for, as far as Merlin can tell, absolutely no reason whatsoever.

So to be in the same league again, and on teams that are historically rivals...well, that feels fucking good, in fact.

The prospect of actually seeing Arthur again though, and (maybe) talking to him? Not as much.

 

 

The first match of the last stage of the season starts two weeks later. It’s a rematch: the Knights of Camelot versus the Ealdor Warlocks. Last season the two teams had competed in the finals—and the Knights had just barely won, earning the championship title and the prize pool. The Warlocks are more than ready for a rematch.

“Remember our strategies,” Gaius says as the team waits to go out on the stadium stage. He is pacing back and forth across the room. “Just keep your heads and remember what we’ve practiced. How are you feeling, Merlin?”

“Okay,” Merlin says, “I think.” He has played on stage tons of times before—but not professionally, not in this arena, not with this level of stakes, not with this team.

And not against Arthur.

The commentator’s voice booms over the loudspeakers from the stadium. “Introducing our previous season runner-ups, the Ealdor Warlocks!”

The team members all look at each other for just a moment, a half-second. Morgana nods. Gwen smiles. “Come on,” she says, and they file out into the stadium to the sound of a screaming audience. Morgana and Freya, the team’s attack duo, walk out first to cheers and whistles, then Gwen and Will, the tanks, and last is Merlin, his heart racing, blood rushing in his ears. Everything is huge and bright and chaotic, and he processes only glimpses of the crowd and stage. A sign in the audience catches his eye. Bright purple letters spell out: KNIGHTS OVERRATED, LAST SEASON OUTDATED, LONG HAVE WE AWAITED, EMRYS ACTIVATED!

Merlin grins.

He and the rest of the Warlocks sit in their seats on the left side of the stage. Above and behind them is the huge screen that will display the match to the crowd. It is currently showing clips from the last time the Warlocks and Knights played each other in the previous season finals. Merlin sits on the end towards the middle of the stage; he can look to his right and see all the seats where the Knights will sit after they walk out.

His mouth is dry. He grabs one of the hand warmers on the desk in front of him and starts shaking it while the others talk over the comm headsets to each other. Gwen, team captain, is laying out their battle plan.

“Just remember—Le_fay and bastet, don’t go too far out without iamwill, and pull back to me if you get in trouble. Me and Emrys will watch your backs.” On stage, Gwen always uses their gamertags and not their names. Not even Morgana ever complains about this.

“Aye aye, cap’n,” Will says, but anything Freya or Morgana might add is drowned out by the screams of the crowd as the Knights of Camelot take the stage.

Merlin does not look at them, does not look up from his screen which he is staring at intensely, not even when the small green light on the top right of his monitor flicks on to indicate that the camera trained on his face is live and its footage is currently displayed on the stadium screen for everyone to see. He hopes he isn’t noticeably flushed. He can hear the commentators saying something about the old iconic duo, Emrys and crownprince, and how Emrys’s addition to the Warlocks further solidifies the rivalry between these two teams.

Merlin does not look up, he doesn’t look up, he doesn’t look up, and then he does and out of the corner of his eye he can see Arthur’s face plastered on the screen behind them. Arthur is looking offscreen, to the left. Merlin looks over at the Knights, just briefly—

And Arthur is seated at the end, sitting directly across from Merlin, looking at him, though he tears his gaze away as soon as he sees Merlin glance over. The audience screams and thumps their feet on the ground.

Fuck, Merlin thinks. Before he can react any other way, the match begins and he has other things to worry about.

“All right, you lot,” Gwen says. “Let’s kick their ass.”

 

 

They don’t.

Everyone is quiet on their way back to the team house. “So,” Gwen finally says, and she smiles a little. “Looks like we’re gonna have to grind our asses off this season, huh?”

When they watch the match later with Gaius, going over everything that went wrong and everything that went right, Merlin pays careful attention to Arthur’s performance. He can anticipate every move, counter every action. But of course, Arthur can do the same for him.

That’s a problem, Merlin thinks, but not one he is quite sure how to solve. Their next few matches are against the Avalon Sidhe and Cambian Serkets. The Warlocks aren’t playing the Knights again until the end of season. That’s plenty of time to prepare. Merlin hopes.

 

 

Arthur has not been asked about duoing with Merlin since the very start of the season. Arthur going pro while Merlin didn’t was originally a huge scandal, but as the weeks progressed and the season got underway, everyone soon forgot about it. There was nothing more to say, really; Merlin was still stuck in contenders, and when he was asked about it on his streams Merlin gave neutral, noncommittal answers. But now Merlin is in the pro league, and the Knights have just beat the Warlocks for the first time this season, and when Arthur is giving the post-game interview with the desk analyst in front of the crowd, she asks, “You really held your team together today and adapted well to the Warlock’s strats. What was it like playing against your former teammate Emrys? Was it hard because you know him so well, or did that make it easy? Do you still anticipate his plays?”

Arthur’s mind goes utterly blank. “Um,” he says, and glances over at Leon and Lancelot for help. They both shrug at him. Gwaine looks delighted.

“It’s fine,” Arthur finally manages. He can feel his face going red. “It’s like playing against anyone else really. I don’t think about it. I just focus on the match and what my team is doing.”

Lie, lie, lie, lie. The analyst, clearly unsatisfied, says something to segue the conversation into the next topic. Arthur answers the rest of her questions on autopilot as feeling slowly returns to his numb face.

“Good one, captain,” Elyan says when they file their way out of the stadium to head back to the team house. “’It’s fine,’ real articulate and honest.”

“Shut up, El,” Arthur mutters. “She surprised me.”

Elyan snickers. “I was getting sick of everyone asking me what it’s like to play against Gwen, anyway, so thank god for this.”

“Lucky you,” Arthur says darkly.

Predictably, Uther chews them out that night even though they won. They weren’t quick enough getting to the objectives, their defense wasn’t strong enough, they lost points when they shouldn’t have, on and on and on. Arthur tunes most of it out. He has heard it all before, anyway. They have more games tomorrow and Saturday, but Arthur isn’t worried about them. The midseason changes to the other teams and the current game meta means that things will be new and interesting, but it won’t be enough for the other teams to take down the Knights. Probably.

Not necessarily the best mindset for team captain to have, but Arthur has other things on his mind at the moment.

  

 

Arthur boots up Albion Tournaments on his own computer when the rest of the team has retired for the night or are playing other games together to take a break from the constant repetition of their work. Arthur can’t play other games during the season, though. He doesn’t want to get any more distracted.

He is messing around with his settings and trying to decide if he even really wants to play when he gets a message through the in-game chat on the bottom left of his screen.

>Emrys says: hey  
>wanna duo?

Arthur stares at the message. He really wishes he had logged on to his side account instead of his main. Not even Merlin knows the username for that account.

With fingers that feel clumsier than they rightfully should on a keyboard he is so familiar with, Arthur responds: >are you streaming?

While waiting for a response he tabs over to Twitch to check for himself if Merlin’s stream is live. It is, of course; Merlin has made a name for himself this past year as a wildly popular support streamer. Arthur clicks on the video and watches the viewer chat on the right side of the screen fill with emotes and people capslocking “PRINCEMRYS DUO!!!” over and over again. Arthur puts his head in his hands.

>Emrys says: yeah  
>I can stop though  
>if you wanna chill

Arthur very much does not want to chill, or duo. His traitorous, traitorous hands type out: >thats ok, let’s do it.

The Twitch chat explodes as soon as they see his response. Merlin, who is using a facecam for the stream, which means that Arthur can see him on the computer screen in front of him, grins. “Hell yeah, chat, I told you he would.”

He told them that Arthur would?

He _knew?_

Arthur takes a breath and puts on his headset. When the party invite from Merlin pops up on his screen, he accepts it.

“Hey man,” Merlin says in his ear. It is as if he is standing right behind Arthur, leaning over his shoulder. “Long time no queue.”

“Yeah,” Arthur says. He can’t really think. “Let’s roll and smoke ‘em, my dude.”

It is empirically the worst thing that he has ever said in his life. Merlin bursts out laughing. He sounds so close, so familiar, so fucking warm and teasing that Arthur has to resist the urge to hurl his headset across the room. It cost eighty dollars, though, so he doesn’t.

“Yeah,” Merlin says, still laughing. “Ez clap.”

They win every single match they play that night. And they play a lot of them. The conversation stays light, superficial; Arthur can’t tell if this is because Merlin does not have anything else to say to Arthur, or if it is because they’re streaming and he doesn’t want to deal with his chat’s reactions. There is no way for Arthur to ask, and he can’t bring himself to say any of the things running through his head, so he finds himself defaulting to the things they used to talk about in a match together, back when they were The Duo in the Albion Tournaments contenders scene.

“I think that’s it for me tonight,” Merlin says when he is ending the stream later. Arthur has stayed up about two hours later than he intended to, and he is not quite sure where the time went. “Thanks for the carry, Arthur.”

_Arthur._

“Yeah,” Arthur says, hoarse. “I mean, it was all you.”

The chat for Merlin’s stream fills with purple hearts, one lone poster still spamming PRINCEMRYS ACTIVATED, and then disappears. Merlin says over the headset, “See you on stage, yeah?” and without saying anything else, he logs off and, presumably, goes to bed, and does not lie awake hounded with anxiety and all the things that he should have said bouncing around in his thoughts the way Arthur does.

 

   

Holy shit, Merlin thinks. He has been grinning for what feels like the past three hours—part of it was a performance for the stream, but part of it (a more significant part of it than he would ever admit) was just instinctive. He looks at his dark monitor, tapping his fingers on his desk, and lets the smile slowly fade.

He wonders, not for the first time, what went wrong when Arthur got signed, what he did that made Arthur stop talking to him without any explanation, at least none that Merlin understood. First Merlin had been confused, then hurt, then angry, then resigned; he hasn’t bothered trying to contact Arthur until tonight, because it seemed obvious enough that Arthur did not want to be contacted, and Merlin wasn’t going to push it. But he still has no idea what he did.

Messaging Arthur tonight had been entirely on impulse. Merlin had seen Arthur’s account go online and sent the message without thinking. He had expected Arthur to simply ignore it, but...he hadn’t.

Merlin remembers being on stage earlier: the lights, the continuous roar of the crowd, the adrenaline putting everything into hypercolor. The way all of that had faded to a background buzz when Merlin glanced over and saw Arthur looking at him from the other side of the stage.

Look: Merlin knows his own feelings, his own heart. He has known how he feels about Arthur since long before either of them ever made a name for themselves playing this game. And he was never particularly good at concealing the way he felt, but it hadn’t seemed to matter then. If Arthur noticed, he hadn’t said anything. And sometimes Merlin had even thought that he wasn’t the only one who felt the way he did.

That doesn’t matter now, of course, because clearly Merlin had been mistaken. But playing with Arthur tonight had brought all those old—though not at all forgotten or faded—feelings back in full force, and Merlin can feel himself becoming bitter and hurt all over again.

It had been stupid to duo with Arthur tonight. They aren’t teammates, they aren’t even friends any more. All this will do is draw out the pain Merlin feels. Merlin buries his face in his hands and groans aloud.

Someone knocks on the doorframe to his room. Merlin whirls around in his chair. Gwen is standing there, wearing pjs and looking half-asleep.

“You should get some rest,” she says sternly. “That’s an order from your captain.” But then she smiles at him. “I saw some of the stream.”

“Oh, god,” Merlin says.

“Yeah.” But Gwen’s smile is gentle. “Just keep your focus on this season, okay? I mean....” She hesitates. “I’ll be around, if you need any help with that. Or anything. As a friend,” she clarifies quickly.

Still embarrassed—he has always been emotionally transparent, but he had hoped that this, at least, would not become common knowledge among his new teammates—but a little relieved, too, Merlin smiles back at Gwen. It has been hard, really, to live with this by himself for so long. “I appreciate that, captain.”

Gwen nods and turns to leave—then stops herself, and faces Merlin. “Listen,” she says, “you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, but I can’t help but wonder—I mean, everyone’s been wondering. What happened to you two, anyway?”

Merlin looks back at his monitor, still dark. “I don’t know,” he says. “I wish I did.”

 

   

 _“Dude.”_ Something heavy lands on Arthur’s bed, and Arthur wakes up once more to Gwaine hitting him repeatedly with a pillow. “I can’t believe you streamed with him! What the hell?”

Arthur wrestles the pillow away from Gwaine and pushes him off the bed. “Have you ever heard of knocking?”

“Please,” Gwaine says. “We are teammates. Comrades. The closest of friends. Brothers, bound by the strongest of bonds. How could you duo with Emrys on stream and not even _tell_ me?”

“It’s not a big deal,” Arthur says with discomfort, partly because he doesn’t want to talk about this, partly because Gwaine is trying to smother him with the pillow.

“Not a big deal?” Gwaine says in absolute horror. “I can’t believe you. I’ve never been so betrayed.”

Arthur pushes him off again. “What about when Lancelot left you to die mid-match in the playoffs last year?” Gwaine hadn’t shut up about that for a month afterwards.

“Yeah, that was pretty bad,” Gwaine says. “But I dunno, man. This might be worse.”

Arthur does not want to even begin to unpack that statement. “Whatever.” He rolls on to his side so that he doesn’t have to look at Gwaine anymore. He feels overtired and heavy, like even sitting up in bed would be too much to handle right now.

There is a moment of silence, and then Gwaine sets the pillow aside and sits on the edge of Arthur’s bed. “Listen,” he says at last. “We all just want you to be happy, Arthur.”

Arthur shuts his eyes very tightly. “Okay.”

Gwaine sighs. “You are the worst.” He pauses for another moment, and then: “Are you ever going to talk about it? To anyone? It doesn’t have to be me. I know that Lancelot....” He trails off.

“Talk about what?” Arthur says.

“Oh my god,” Gwaine says. _“Merlin._ Right after you got signed, your whole shit blew up. No one knew what was going on with you, you suddenly stopped playing with your best friend, stopped _talking_ to him completely, and then you spend three months not mentioning it ever, to anyone. Then Merlin joins the league and you spend two whole weeks being the weirdest you’ve ever been, not talking, not shot-calling during scrims, nothing, and then you’re on his stream for three hours last night, and you have nothing to talk about? Nothing?”

Arthur rolls over and looks at Gwaine for a moment. Then he takes the pillow from him and slowly places it over his own face.

“Please,” he says. “If you’re really my friend, you'll kill me now.”

“I’m rolling my eyes,” Gwaine says. “You can’t see me, but I need you to know that.”

And he waits. He knows Arthur well enough by now—too well—to know that time to think, to work up the courage to speak truthfully, is what Arthur needs the most right now.

Arthur puts the pillow aside and stares steadfastly at the ceiling. He can think of what to say—he can think of a million things to say, all of them mostly true, none of them exactly what he means or wants to tell Gwaine. “When I left the Dragons,” he says, and stops, and has to start over. “When I left, he.... We’d been playing together for so long. I guess I was stupid, or too hopeful, or something, I thought—you know, sometimes people get signed together, it’s rare, but it happens. I didn’t know what was gonna happen if we ended up on different teams. I didn’t want to think about it. But then he didn’t get signed at all, and I did. And he was so happy for me.”

Gwaine stares at him. Arthur doesn’t meet his gaze. He is waiting for Gwaine to make fun of him, to tell him that this makes no sense, because it doesn’t. Months later, Arthur still cannot make sense of his own emotional reactions to what happened, why he said and did the things he had. But Gwaine doesn’t say that that.

“You weren’t, though,” he says instead, and Arthur, unable to speak anymore, just nods. Gwaine sits motionless for a moment, apparently lost in thought. “I get it, man. It’s hard to leave your first team. Even to go pro.”

In a moment of hoarse honesty that he had not been expecting, Arthur says, “It wasn’t leaving the team that was hard.”

Gwaine just gives him a look. “I know.”

“I don’t know how I thought he would react,” Arthur says. “I hadn’t accepted the offer yet. Though I guess I was going to. You don’t just turn down the chance to go pro. And I didn’t have a reason. But I thought maybe he didn’t even care that I was leaving. And I guess I couldn’t handle that.”

“You were upset,” Gwaine says, slowly, “that he wasn’t upset.” He looks at Arthur again. “That’s pretty messed up.”

“Yeah,” Arthur says. “Tell me something I don’t fucking know.”

“Why didn’t you just tell him?”

“Tell him what?”

“Arthur.” Gwaine rubs his face. “Seriously? Oh my god.” A look of horror crosses his expression. “You don’t even know.”

“Know _what?”_

“What you were feeling. Are feeling, I guess.”

“Geez,” Arthur says, irritated—and also terrified, because figuring out what he feels has always been hard for him to do, if not impossible, and he really would rather not have Gwaine know that, or worse, tell Arthur what he is feeling. “I didn’t realize you were the team therapist.”

Gwaine looks suddenly serious. “You know, we should have one of those.”

“Is that in our contracts?”

“I don’t think so. It should be.” Gwaine pauses. “Maybe we should unionize.”

“For free therapy?”

“Yeah,” Gwaine says. “Full health care benefits, baby. Anyway.” He puts his hand on Arthur’s shoulder. “Listen. I know feelings are hard, but you and Merlin had something special. And it might be too late now to go back to the way things were or make things right—I don’t know. That’s up to Merlin. But I think you should try.”

Arthur covers his face with his hands. Talking to Gwaine is always this sort of emotional whiplash: lighthearted one second, and heartfelt the next. Arthur, who needs about a full week to work himself up to a hard conversation, wonders how the hell he got himself into this. “I don’t know how.”

“Just be honest with him,” Gwaine says. And then his voice goes very serious. “And with yourself.” He squeezes Arthur’s shoulder. “That’s all the help I think I can give you, man. Good luck.”

“Thanks, Gwaine,” Arthur mumbles, his voice muffled by his hands, and Gwaine laughs as he leaves the room.

 

 

The Knights’ next match against the Warlocks is a couple weeks later. The stadium is loud, the fans all on their feet. The Warlocks are already on the stage when the Knights walk out, and Arthur keeps his eyes forward, his focus trained on getting to his chair and putting on his headset and starting the pep talk he prepared the night before. He says it semi-automatically, the routine familiar and calming in its own way—but in the last few moments before the match is about to start, Arthur cannot help but glance to his left at last.

Merlin is leaning forward in his seat, talking into his headset, his shoulders tense and hunched. He looks intense and focused, his hands moving quick over the keyboard and mouse, and he laughs at something one of his teammates says. Suddenly the roar of the crowd becomes even louder. Arthur’s stomach flips, and he realizes the green light on the top-right of his monitor has flicked on: meaning his face is projected on the screen behind them, and the whole audience can see exactly where he is looking.

It takes a moment for Merlin to realize, apparently. When he does, his hands stop moving on the keyboard in front of him. And then he looks over at Arthur and winks.

Arthur looks away at once. The crowd is yelling itself hoarse. Lancelot and Elyan are laughing, and right as the match starts, the in-game chat pops up on everyone’s monitors.

>Emrys says: gl hf ;)

“Oh my god,” Arthur says. He almost puts head down on the desk, then remembers the cameras and has to forcibly restrain himself.

“Keep your head in the game, cap,” Gwaine says cheerfully over the comms, and then adds in the game chat: >YOU TOO BRO :D

(“Merlin...” Gwen says. “Are you sure about—”

Merlin doesn’t look at her. He can feel the tips of his ears growing warm.

“No, this is good,” Morgana says. “Mind games, I like it. Let’s do this.”)

The match is a set of four rounds. The Knights win the first, then second. But the Warlocks win the second and third, and that means they have to go to a fifth round for the tiebreaker.

If the Warlocks win here, they will pull off a reverse sweep for the win—and it will be the only time in league history that the Knights have ever won the first two rounds only to lose the match.

“Stay focused,” Arthur says over the comms, gritting his teeth.

“We _are_ focused,” Lancelot says. “Are you all right? You’ve been—”

“All over the fucking place,” says Leon. “Sorry, captain.”

“I swear to god, if you’re throwing the match because you think it’s some sort of grand romantic gesture, I will never forgive you,” Gwaine says. Arthur chokes on his response. Before he can say anything else, the match starts.

The Warlocks are playing out of their minds. They are a good team, of course, they always have been; Arthur has never been foolish enough to underestimate them. But the addition of Merlin to their roster, and the few weeks of practice that they’ve had as a full team now, seems to have utterly changed their playstyles. Where Morgana had previously been easy to bait into traps and cut off from the rest of her team, now she sticks to them relentlessly, leaving no openings for the Knights to exploit. She and Freya swoop in for the kill on Gwaine and Lancelot and gain the upper hand nearly every time. And Will, whose off-tank play was a little shaky the previous season, never misses a chance now to dive on the Knights when they aren’t expecting it, then retreat and leave space for Freya and Morgana to claim the kills.

And Gwen and Merlin...well.

Gwen has always been good. And Merlin. But their playstyles complement each other’s in a way Arthur was not expecting. Gwen is sharp and tactical, Merlin swift and efficient. Arthur finds himself outplayed by the two of them nearly every time.

“OH MY GOD,” Gwaine shouts into the comms about halfway through the round, “CAN SOMEONE PLEASE KILL EMRYS.”

But no one does. And the Warlocks win.

In a daze, Arthur stands with the rest of the Knights to shake hands with the other team. The lights are everywhere, and his head is buzzing with all the plays he should have made, and as he crosses the stage towards the Warlocks, all he can see is Merlin, waiting for him and smiling.

Merlin takes Arthur’s hand. “Good game.” His smile is crooked, like he is making fun of Arthur but trying to hide it, like he is remembering something Arthur has forgotten but that Merlin would tell him if Arthur would only ask.

And Arthur thinks: oh, fuck.

  

 

>coolknight69 says: dude stop hiding in ur room its sad  
>we all messed up its not ur fault  
>i know uther was mad but hes always mad lol

>crownprince says: I’m not hiding

>knightgallant says: if you don’t come downstairs, we are going to break down your door and force you to partake in human interaction for your own good.

>coolknight69: ^^^

>crownprince says: -_______- fine  
>crownprince has left the game

 

 

>queeng says: great job today

>Emrys says: thanks :)

>queeng says: are you okay?

>Emrys says: why wouldn’t I be?

>queeng says: hmmm

>bastet says: lol 'why wouldn’t i be' he says  
>we all know how hard it is to play against old teammates  
>you did good.

>iamwill says: yeah, it’s great to finally have a competent healer on the team  
>for ONCE

>Le_fay says: I am going to obliterate you little man

>iamwill says: lol  
>anyone want in-n-out? i’m getting in-n-out

>queeng says: take merlin or he’s going to sulk in his room all night

>Emrys says: hey :(

>iamwill says: lololol

 

  

>crownprince says: hey  
>can I come over?

>Emrys says: what?

>crownprince says: to your team house  
>there’s some stuff I want to say. and apologize for I guess  
>I understand if you don’t want to hear it though

>Emrys says: um  
>I guess  
>now?

>crownprince says: if that’s okay

>Emrys says: yeah

>crownprince says: thank you

 

 

Merlin goes downstairs in a daze. Gwen is at the kitchen table rewatching their match against the Knights, her headphones on, a notebook by her side in which she is taking copious notes. Merlin gestures for her to take the headphones off, and she does.

“Arthur is coming over,” Merlin says helplessly. “He wants to talk.” To apologize, apparently, but Merlin doesn’t have the strength to say that right now.

Gwen’s forehead creases and she pushes her laptop aside. “Talk about what?”

“I don’t know,” Merlin says, even though he is pretty sure he does. Or hopes he does. If Arthur doesn’t say what Merlin hopes, though, Merlin does not know what he’ll do.

“About time, I guess,” Gwen says. “Are you all right? Do you want me to be there with you? I can...yell at him, or something.”

“I don’t know. No,” Merlin says. “But can you keep the others from coming down here?” He dreads the idea of Will or Morgana overhearing this conversation. Not because they would be mean—they might very well even be understanding—but that would somehow be even worse.

“Of course.” Gwen closes her laptop and gets up from the table. “Just yell if you need me. Or text. Or send smoke signals.”

When Gwen has left, Merlin paces around the kitchen, opening and closing cabinets uselessly. Is he ready for this? He doesn’t know. What does he possibly have to say to Arthur right now? I miss you? I wish I knew what happened? Why didn’t you just talk to me?

The old anger surges back all at once. What can Arthur even say at this point to make things all right? Merlin isn’t sure the right words exist. And Arthur is not known for being particularly eloquent with his thoughts. Where Merlin may once have been understanding about that and attempted to help Arthur say what he is trying to say, he is not feeling especially charitable in that regard at the moment.

Someone knocks on the front door. Arthur. Merlin takes a deep breath, and goes to let him in.

“Hi,” Arthur says when Merlin opens the door. He has his hands in his pockets, his shoulders hunched. His hair is flat against his forehead, a little damp from the misting evening rain.

“Hi,” Merlin says. Feeling his heart pound traitorously in his chest. “Come in.”

They enter the kitchen. Arthur stands there awkwardly, still hiding his hands, and Merlin does not know what to say. He hopes Gwen has successfully gotten the others not to eavesdrop.

“Good game today,” Arthur says. “You deserved the win.”

“Thanks.” Merlin thinks about telling Arthur that he played well, but it is not really true, and he doesn’t want to condescend. Even now.

Arthur nods silently, like he expected Merlin’s short answer, and accepts it. He looks around the kitchen for a long moment, his mouth working in the way it does when he has something to say and keeps biting the inside of his lip instead. Then stands up a little straighter. “I came to apologize, so I guess I’d better do it, huh?”

“Probably,” Merlin says. “Unless you’ve decided that you aren’t sorry.”

Arthur makes a strangled laugh. “Hardly.” He stares at the sink for a moment. Nods to himself. “I didn’t want to admit to myself what I was actually afraid of when I left the Dragons. Because I was. Very much so. And I told myself it was the stress of joining a new team and going pro for the first time, but that wasn’t true. It was losing you that scared me. And then of course I pushed you away, because I was too scared to try and hold on, either. That wasn’t fair, it was selfish. And I’m so sorry, Merlin. You didn’t deserve that.”

“You....” Merlin stares at him. Arthur won’t meet his gaze.

Merlin sits at the table and buries his face in his hands. “You are such an _asshole.”_

Of course of course of _course_ this is what it is, the answer to all Merlin’s questions. It is unbearably simple and so utterly stupid. It is almost a relief, in its own way—at least it iss nothing Merlin had done, and it is something that, in a small way, makes at least a little sense; but on the other hand Merlin cannot help but wonder how Arthur ever thought, even in his deepest most hidden doubts, that Merlin was ever going to leave him for anything.

Arthur looks at Merlin, wide-eyed. “I know,” he says. “Listen—”

“No,” Merlin says. “You listen. You are so utterly—so _entirely_ self-preoccupied—you never stop to think before making up your mind about something. How would you have _lost_ me?”

“I’m not saying it makes sense,” Arthur says, miserable.

“Christ.” Merlin lowers his hands to the table.

“I’m sorry.”

“Stop saying that,” Merlin says. Because how can he tell himself that he has never feared exactly what Arthur had: losing him? But it still fucking hurts, still stings, because it should never have been a question in Arthur’s mind. And maybe that is something that Merlin can fix now.

“Okay,” Arthur says. “...Sorry.”

Merlin rubs his temples. For _weeks_ Arthur did not speak to him because of this. It is infuriating. So Merlin says all that he can think of to say, all that he wants to say, all that he has yearned to say for years. “I wasn’t ever going fucking anywhere, Arthur.”

Arthur is silent for a long time. His hands work at his sides, opening and closing. Finally he comes to the table and sits across from Merlin. His face is flushed. “Yeah,” he says at last. “I know that, Merlin.”

“You,” Merlin says, because he can’t stop himself, not anymore, not after all this, “are so afraid of feeling anything.” He has known it for as long as he has known Arthur—but he never knew that fear ran so deep, that it was so intrinsic to Arthur’s nature. It makes Merlin sad, makes him ache.

“And you aren’t?” Arthur asks quietly. “Not ever?”

“Not like that,” Merlin says. He can’t tell if he is angry anymore, can’t tell what exactly he is feeling. He is hyperaware of Arthur’s hands on the table, just inches away from his own. Still opening and closing on nothing.

“I guess you aren’t.” Arthur sounds a little awed. A little sad. “I’m sorry.” He smiles a little. Merlin can see his crooked front teeth catch on his bottom lip.

“You utter ass,” Merlin says. Before Arthur can say anything else, flagellate himself any more, Merlin takes his hand and pulls him close and kisses him, fierce, semi-frantic. Arthur, to his credit, is only frozen with surprise for a brief moment. Then his free hand comes up to the back of Merlin’s neck and holds him close, keeps Merlin from breaking away from the kiss until they are both near-gasping.

“Asshole,” Merlin says again. “I can’t believe you, all this time I thought you hated me, and you—you—”

“I don’t hate you,” Arthur says.

“I should fucking hope not,” says Merlin.

Arthur kisses him again, keeps kissing him until Merlin’s heart finally stops racing and he can feel his fingers again, entwined with Arthur’s, resting atop the table while Arthur’s other hand touches the hair at the nape of Merlin’s neck, the gentle press of the pads of his fingers.

Merlin laughs shakily and presses his forehead to Arthur’s shoulder. “Prick.”

“So you’ve said,” Arthur murmurs.

“You should have just told me. You should have just told me you were scared.”

“I will, from now on. I promise.”

“Okay.” Merlin pulls away from him and withdraws his hand to scrub, hastily, at his eyes. “You’re not really an asshole.”

Arthur smiles. “No, it’s all right. I deserve it.”

“You aren’t.” Merlin puts his hand back on the table, and Arthur takes it and squeezes. “You don’t. Trust me.”

Quietly, Arthur says, “I do.”

Merlin’s face grows hot. They hold hands at the table for a long time, saying nothing. Arthur rubs his thumb over Merlin’s knuckles, over and over again, like he is trying to commit the shape and feel of them to memory. Merlin does not want to move, does not want to end this moment yet. But eventually it has to. Yet that is all right; because he is looking forward to new moments, new conversations, new kisses.

“It’s late, I guess,” Merlin says at last. “Do you have scrims in the morning?”

“Yeah.” Arthur is looking into Merlin’s eyes, clearly not thinking about scrims at all.

Merlin hesitates, then suddenly laughs. “I’m sure someone has a computer here they’d let you use,” he says, “I mean, if—do you want to duo?”

Arthur grins.

 

 

>coolknight69 says: GUYS STOP DUOING WITHOUT ME!! I NEED THE FUCKING CARRY  
>UNLESS THIS IS A DATE NIGHT THING WHICH I GUESS IS FINE  
>STILL NEED A CARRY THO :/

>crownprince says: isn’t lancelot online?

>coolknight69 says: he wont accept my game invites anymore :(

>Emrys says: wow, I can’t believe we’re your second choice

>coolknight69 says: LOL  
>is this really a date thing?  
>cuz that’s kind of sad. go outside guys

>crownprince says: I will block you

>coolknight69 says: u wouldnt

>crownprince has blocked user coolknight69

>coolknight69 says: NOOOOOOOOOOO MY CARRY

 

 

>bastet says: dude is arthur staying over?

>Emrys says: uhhhhhhhhhh

>bastet says: hell yeah dude pogchamp

 

 

The Knights of Camelot and Ealdor Warlocks are 1-1 against each other so far. And in the last, final stage of the season, they both outperform themselves in new ways, exceeding all expectations. Albion Tournaments is taken to an entirely new level. And when the season ends, and the finals are upon them, it is only right that these two teams should the ones facing off against each other once more.

Merlin is nervous, fiddling with his keyboard and settings, making sure everything is ready to go. Gwen is giving the team pep-talk, speaking fast, focused. Everyone is dialed in. Everyone is ready to win.

Merlin glances across the stage at Arthur, who looks up and grins at him. The tightness in Merlin’s chest lightens.

A message pops up in the in-game chat for everyone on both teams to see.

>crownprince says: this message is for Emrys only, THE REST OF THE WARLOCKS DO NOT INTERACT!!!  
>....@Emrys...... hello ;)

Merlin grins.

>Emrys says: <3 <3 <3

>crownprince says: :* gl baby

>Le_fay says: can you guys shut the fuck up I’m trying to frag out over here

>Emrys says: sorry morgana  
>@crownprince <3 <3 good luck  
>you’re gonna need it

>crownprince says: oh no

>queeng says: the match is LITERALLY starting

>coolknight69 says: i hope someone hacks into the game and takes out the in-game text chat, killing us all instantly

>Le_fay says: me too

>bastet says: me too

>ironclad says: me too

>crownprince says: you guys are just jealous :/

>queeng says: everyone shut up  
>good luck knights. have fun

And then, in the game chat that only the Warlocks can see, Gwen writes:

>let’s fucking destroy them.

  

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Gamerspeak:  
> -gamertag: the username a player uses in-game.  
> -Twitch: Twitch.tv, popular video game streaming website. Features a bunch of emotes that have entered gamer vernacular.  
> -pog/pogchamp: an exclamation of hype or excitement. Comes from a Twitch emote.  
> -ez clap: “easy clap,” said when you easily and handily beat another player/team. Comes from a set of Twitch emotes.  
> -gl hf: good luck, have fun  
> -gg: good game  
> -throwing: the intentional act of playing badly so that your team loses the match/the other team wins.  
> -carry: to play so well that you win the match for the rest of your team singlehandedly/help them rise in the rankings.  
> -duo: to play with another player for several matches while the rest of your team changes.  
> -scrims: scrimmages/practice matches.  
> -frag out: to get a bunch of kills/good plays.
> 
> Gamertags:  
> -Merlin: Emrys  
> -Arthur: crownprince  
> -Gwen: queeng  
> -Gwaine: coolknight69  
> -Lancelot: knightgallant  
> -Morgana: Le_fay  
> -Freya: bastet  
> -Elyan: ironclad  
> -Will: iamwill


End file.
